A month ago I wrote an article about HITMAN getting the old snip-snip treatment, with a new editor being hired to possible trim down some of the bloodshed. A few days later, word came that this was inaccurate, and the flick was still headed for an R rating. Fanboys did awkward jigs across the globe…
Well, new news is neither confirming the toning down, nor refuting that the film will not reflect the full vision of its director, Xavier Gens. CHUD has an article, complete with quotes from Timothy Olyphant, where he reveals that reshoots were filmed without Gens at the helm:
“I saw him when I was there [doing the reshoots] but he did not direct the reshoots. I heard the talk on that, that he was fired. I kept saying I was trying to get that guy fired for months. They finally fired him? Fuck! I was saying that forever. He doesn’t speak English, didn’t anybody see that?”
Before everyone flips out, that last part was meant sarcastically. Olyphant goes on to talk about the nature of the film’s violence, and the rumors of it being lessoned so that HITMAN might receive a PG-13 rating : “I’m aware of that too, that that was being talked about. I have no information that supports that at all. I’ve had conversations that they don’t have to have with me at all, but I’ve been very involved, and they’ve kept me in the loop here at the studio, and there was never a conversation that I’ve had with any of the executives here or the producers in France or Xavier that was about fear of being too violent. The only conversations we’ve had have been creative conversations about the kind of violence and where it hurts or helps the story. There’s no way it’s not a violent film. We’d have a forty five minute film – we shot a very violent film. If there’s any truth to that rumor at all, there’s always a conversation about what you’re trying to elicit from the audience. There’s a difference between the violence in James Bond films – especially the ones from the past – as opposed to the violence in a Quentin Tarantino film versus violence in a horror film or something designed to make you uncomfortable. ”
Soooo, it sounds to me like Gens may have been piling on the bloodshed a little heavy (just my interpretation). I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again – you hire that guy who directed FRONTIERE(S), which is probably going to get an NC-17 and is supposedly a bloody freakshow – to direct your big-budget video game adaptation, and you’re surprised he went a little overboard: you’re a bonehead. To put it lightly.
We’ll find out what this film’s got when it gets released November 21.
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